Smart Trashcan Moves To Catch Your Aimlessly Tossed Trash

Meet the so-called “Smart Trashbox.” It is a trash receptacle that can sense where you wildly and chaotically toss your random bits of trash, and then move to catch them.

According to Mashable, the so-called “Smart Trashbox” is a trashcan on wheels that “can catch what you throw away, ensuring your screwed-up paper and empty beer cans don’t end up on the floor.” The smart trashcan was created by the Japanese, specifically the modder FRP. It can do the crazy thing it does thanks to Kinect sensors that monitor and track bits of trash as they are thrown. It then calculates the trash’s trajectory, and maneuvers itself underneath the falling refuse using a motorized wheel base to catch it.

The thing is actually quite impressive, with Jamie Rigg of Engadget remarking, “Impressively, it appears he [modder FRP] designed and built every piece of the puzzle himself, from the motorized wheel base right down to the PCB,” said Rigg. “We dread to think how much coding this took, given that the Kinect monitors the entire room, calculates trash trajectory and sends the can interception orders.”

The smart trashcan isn’t perfect yet, as it isn’t exactly able to catch all of the garbage thrown at it. Nevertheless, it’s a pretty impressive piece of work, sparking fears all over again that no, it won’t be a zombie apocalypse that signals the end of humanity. We always knew it would be robots.

Of course there’s a video, which I have posted for your eye-buds.